Tips for eating low-fat raw efficiently?

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Permalink Reply by VOID on August 16, 2008 at 8:46am

I agree, hemp is great. I digest hemp better than any nut or seed. Im considering eating that regularly. Doug may not agree its natural food for us, but then neither is his Tahini. lol.

Take Care

Adam x

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Permalink Reply by nycgrrl on September 3, 2008 at 8:40pm

I think hemp is a great food too, and I lean towards the 811 camp.

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Permalink Reply by Steve Pavlina on August 16, 2008 at 11:52am

I've never tried using hemp seeds in smoothies. I generally thought it was best to avoid mixing fruit and fat at the same meal.

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Permalink Reply by Matt Mueller on August 16, 2008 at 3:54pm

this is tongue in cheek but it's not about thoughts it's about experience. i say give it a whirl.

steve and I really want to know about how you got into disc golf and your personal experience with it. do you play courses out in vegas? so far you are the only other person on this board to my knowledge that plays. right now I am on a huge disc golf kick.

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Permalink Reply by Steve Pavlina on August 16, 2008 at 5:21pm

Left a comment on your page to answer this. I first got into it with some college friends, maybe 17 years ago. Then picked it up again about 2 years ago in Vegas. I play the Sunset Park and Mountain Crest Park courses reguarly.

I'm only a casual player though... I've never done any tournaments.

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Permalink Reply by Steve Pavlina on August 16, 2008 at 12:09pm

Just to clarify, I can get enough calories eating mostly fruit. That isn't the problem. I've eaten as many as 20 bananas in a day along with other fruit and greens.

But long-term I find it very challenging (annoying would be more accurate) to eat so much fruit day after day, not because my stomach can't hold it but because I get totally turned off by the sweet taste and the texture of fruit if I eat so much of it. The thought of putting anything sweet in my mouth begins to sicken me after a while.

People suggested that I eat more greens and veggies. That worked. It helps balance out the sweetness of the fruit for sure, but if I eat more veggies, then I have to eat even more food each day to get enough calories, especially since I like to exercise.

The high fruit + high veggies path leads me to keep returning to the kitchen for more food, and since I'm traveling more lately (at least once a month), this style doesn't seem as practical when I'm on the road. So I'm concerned that the lots of fruit + lots of veggies approach won't be realistic for me in the long run. I feel this is the best eating style for me energetically, but the way I've been doing it seems very inefficient and fairly distracting with all the food prep, eating, and frequent trips to the bathroom. When I eat like this I feel like I'm living just to eat. Sure I have an abundance of energy, but it seems like I have to center every day around food, and eating this way on the road -- I don't see how that's possible.

So mainly for efficiency's sake, I keep returning to denser foods like nuts. This lowers my energy a bit, but I can eat quickly and go for hours without eating again, not to mention that it reduces trips to the bathroom.

What I'd really like is to find a practical way to get the benefits of low-fat raw without feeling that I must become a bonobo. Is that possible?

You could say I'm feeling challenged to find a good long-term approach to eating raw in a non-raw world without having to turn my diet into my career.

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Permalink Reply by coco on August 16, 2008 at 12:20pm

my experience is: get a vitamix and blend, blend, blend.
personally, nuts and seeds do not work for me, no matter if i eat them alone or with other things. i get a lot of calories from blended foods; i actually have to watch that i don't overdo it, and i am VERY active.
there certainly are food combinations that cause digestive distress, but with raw foods, i think people can tolerate different things. blending certain fruits together (for example, i throw in whole oranges and bananas with wheatgrass juice) can be different than eating a spinach salad with a side of apples. it's a lot of trial and error.

i'm sure there are going to be people who want to crucify me for suggesting blending. is it natural? did our ancestors do it? well...we all have to make choices based on what works for us. besides, did our ancestors sit in front of computers and use the internet, or talk on cellular telephones? no...but that's beside the point. i think if something works for you, do it! i mean honestly WORKS...so many people are stubborn and insist a thing works, just so they can use a label or a name (this brings to mind my "bodybuilder" diet of the past, and all those chemical protein shakes, ugh).

also, if you like pears, try to load up on them. it seems that since they are softer, they are easier to eat in quantity:)

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Permalink Reply by Dorota on August 16, 2008 at 3:13pm

Steve, I listened to your interview with Haeske where he suggested blending salads for efficiency. Has that worked at all?

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Permalink Reply by Steve Pavlina on August 16, 2008 at 3:28pm

I tried blended salads, but my taste buds said blech. It was hard to drink it down. Maybe I just don't have good recipes for blended salads though.

I like raw soups, but pretty much only when they include lots of fat like avocado.

I like fresh veggie juices, but the clean-up is more work than when I use the Vitamix.

Maybe if I could find a blended salad recipe I liked that was also low fat, that would help.

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Permalink Reply by Dorota on August 17, 2008 at 5:34am

I think a lot of a person's mentality has to change when switching to raw. When you eat cooked, you have the 3 meals a day, eat your meal, and forget about it until the next one. When eating low-fat raw, this traditional approach just doesn't work - or at least it has not worked for me. Firstly because simply of the volume of food - I just can't chew that much in one sitting. Secondly, because even if I do blend it, I feel nauseated if I consume a large quantity all at once.

I do have a smoothie in the morning and a big salad at night, but during the day I find myself simply grazing on fruit and veggies or pre-made smoothies. Some tips which have worked for me are:
*keeping a large bottle of smoothie/juice with me and sip on it throughout the day.
*keeping a large bag of pre-cut veggies with me. Sometimes I don't even know when they disappear!
*Energy bars. I find raw energy bars really great on the go. I pre-make a batch and keep them in the fridge. I generally make them out of hemp powder, flax seeds, sun flower seeds, bananas and dates.
*Sprouted beans are good for staving off hunger and are low in fat. I make raw burgers comprised of beans and veggies and a small amount of nuts when I really feel that need to eat something "heavy". I find them quite filling.

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Permalink Reply by kayell on August 17, 2008 at 6:56am

I don't like most blended salads at all either. The taste of romaine in a smoothie is disgusting to me. *shudder* But I can add at least 4.5 ounces of baby spinach to a big (quart container full) juicy, somewhat tart fruit smoothie, and it tastes fine. (The color may get strange, esp if there were berries in the smoothie!)

I do eat what could be called blended salads I guess, but are really more soups - smooth gazpacho, and blended tomato/spinach (not sweet) soups. Oddly, trying to drink them, rather than eating with a spoon, seemed to change the perceived flavor to not so good. If you don't like soups smooth without lots of avocado, maybe try them a bit chunkier. Or add a moderate amount of avocado (do the averaging fat across a week bit) and gradually scale back with each time you make the soup.

Chopped salads are also a good way to condense into manageability a vast quantity of food.

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Permalink Reply by Laura Bruno on September 4, 2008 at 3:03am

You might want to try incorporating more wild greens like dandelion, purslane, malva, lambsquarters, etc. into your smoothies. These tend to taste more bitter, so you can add a lot of fruit, get your calories, but not taste particularly sweet. I also love mango cilantro smoothies now. I use at least an entire bunch of cilantro in there w/ my mango and bananas. The sweetness tastes less overpowering that way, and you don't need to add any fats. Another trick: mango, goji berries, and oranges all blended together with a handful of spinach. The extra protein in the goji's will keep you feeling more balanced and less in need of immediate food, but you can load up on the sweeter fruits b/c the tartness of the goji's balances some of that.

But the wild greens really help! I don't do 811 since I really love eating gourmet raw foods and want the flexibility and freedom to enjoy them. When staying at home or traveling somewhere that doesn't offer the gourmet raw foods, though, I find the wild greens really allow a decrease in fat. In a pinch, bring some extra Vitamineral Green or other mineral-rich green powder with you. I travel (or move) a lot, too, and hate having to revolve my life around my food, but the darker greens really satiate and alkalize so much that my body stops rejecting that super sweet flavor. Presto, more calories! Oh, and I know I always mention this to you and that you're not a fan, but up the celery The natural sodium rebalances you so that again you don't reject that sweet flavor.

Also, hemp: if you like the taste, it does satiate with the perfect ratio of omega 3 to omega 6 fats, along w/ chlorophyll and protein. Pumpkin seeds also work well for travel. With their good omega 3's and lots of chlorophyll, you'll crave fewer of them than say, almonds. It comes down to your own personal balancing act, which probably varies by the day. When I need extra energy, I back down my fats and up cacao. When I want to chill or just sleep for a solid eight hours instead of five, extra avocado and coconuts work well. If you tend towards lighter foods most of the time, you will eventually lose your taste and tolerance for nuts. For me, I don't LOVE nuts, but I purposely work them in sometimes b/c I want that flexibility in a pinch. When I'm on vacation or traveling to teach classes, I don't want a crash b/c my totally pure diet suddenly can't handle the only available options. Yes, I know there's always a way; I just prefer less effort on the road. Knowing that I won't want to take the time to chew 20 bananas and 4 salads, it's just easier to keep myself able to handle nuts and seeds.

BTW: the best low fat raw cookbook I've encountered hands down is Cherie Soria's The Raw Revolution Diet. All the recipes are tested--not as 811--but they offer much lower fat than the vast majority of gourmet raw treats. As per my last post on WLIR, I gorged myself on Living Light Cafe's food for three days and still felt light. Considering how much food I consumed, that's saying something! ;)

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